Crafting for Christmas officially starts now!

                                    
Ok now that Lili's birthday is out of the way i can start focusing on Christmas.  There is only 44 days till Christmas day and i have a lot of presents to do.  Now not everyone appreciates homemade gifts but personally i do.  I think it shows someone has made a real effort.  I think that people associate homemade with cheap and that certainly isn't the case most of the time.  With all the cheap shops around it is definitely cheaper to pick up bits from those than make things from scratch.  I have decided that as well as buying presents for family and friends this year i am determined to include in each present at least one item that has been handmade. Bearing this in mind i'd better get some serious crafting done!!.  I'll show you the bits i have done today so far.

Friends testube of mints.  These are dead easy to make if you want to make some.  Just buy some plastic test tubes (i got mine of ebay) and fill with tic tacs then tie some ribbon round with a tag on.  its upto you if you want to put them in a clear sealable bag but i have.  i designed the tag myself on picnik and if anyone wants a copy of it just drop me an e-mail to scratchy.cat@hotmail.co.uk and i send you my jpeg file.

Next i decided to make some animal treat bags.  I haven't got a dog but i will give these to my friend who has a dog grooming business and 2 dogs!.  I might make some for the craft fairs i have coming up to!!.  Again i designed the topper on picnik.com then stuck it onto a piece of backing card.  The text was red but i didn't like ti when it printed so i have gone over it with a black gel pen.

I picked up some red giftbags in tesco which are 20p each but on offer at 3 for 2 and thought i would have a play around.  For some reason i keep chuckling when i look at my finished santa bag.

This next gift bag i have made using some organza.  i have sewed it as a drawstring bag then threaded ribbon through and sewed on the label (which i printed onto the fabric using transfer paper).  then i have put patterned tissue paper inside.

Lastly (slightly cheating as i made this a bit back but only got round to adding the motifs today!) i have made this bag for my niece .